Royal fifth
Encyclopedia
The royal fifth is an old royal tax
that reserves to the monarch
20% of all precious metals and other commodities (including slaves) acquired by his subjects as war loot
, found as treasure
or extracted by mining
. The 'royal fifth' was instituted in Medieval Muslim
states, Christian Iberia
n kingdom
s and their overseas colonial empires during the age of exploration.
The 'royal fifth' has a dual origin. In Christian kingdoms, it partly comes from the Medieval legal conception of seigneural or regalian rights over the natural patrimony, which assigned to the monarch or feudal overlord original property rights over all unclaimed, undiscovered and undeveloped natural resources (e.g. precious metals in the subsoil, salt in the rock, virgin forests, fish in the sea, etc.) within his jurisdiction. Consequently, private individuals who extracted these natural resources owed compensation to their original 'owner' (the monarch).
The specification of the 20% tax rate on war booty, stems from the practice in Islamic states. It was institutionalized from the start of the Islamic conquest, with the rate set down in the Qur'an
, in Sura VIII (Al-Anfal
), verse 41:
In practice, the share of the fifth reserved to the Prophet's family lapsed after Muhammad
's death. The early Rashidun Caliphs, notably Caliph Omar, set down regulatory guidelines for what could and could not be regarded as war spoils, and assigned the fifth for welfare distribution. The 'fifth' eventually became an important source of financing for the Caliphal administration and army. Schools
of Islamic law were divided on whether the fifth extended to treasure
troves and mining
. Some schools (notably, the Hanafi
te), regarded treasure and mines as 'spoils' and thus subject to the fifth, while others (notably the Shafi'i
te and Hanbali
te) regarded them as subject only to the conventional rates, e.g. zakat
.
The Medieval Taifa
kingdoms of al-Andalus
embraced the Hanafi argument and institutionalized the fifth on war spoils, treasure troves and mining. The 'royal fifth' (quinto real) was adopted by the Christian states of the Iberian peninsula
(Castile
, Portugal
, etc.) during the reconquista
and extended during to their overeas colonies in the Americas, Africa and Asia. They became an important part of crown finance.
During the age of exploration, Spanish and Portuguese captains and conquistadores were careful to always set aside the royal fifth from any spoils they captured, and accusations of embezzling the 'royal fifth' ended the careers of a few of them (e.g. Alonso de Ojeda
, Pedro Alonso Niño
). Nonetheless, to encourage exploration and colonization, Iberian monarchs often allowed explorers and colonial developers to retain part or all of the royal fifth, for at least some period of time. The conditions were usually spelled out in captaincy
contracts or royal grants, e.g. in 1402, Jean de Béthencourt
was allowed to keep the royal fifth as a condition for the conquest of the Canary Island for Castile; in 1443, the Portuguese Prince Henry the Navigator was granted the royal fifth on all enterprise in the Madeira
islands and sub-saharan Africa; in 1492, Christopher Columbus
was allowed to retain 10% of the royal fifth of the West Indies (although he famously argued he was promised more); the 1532 contracts of the captains-donatary of colonial Brazil
allowed them to retain 5% of the royal fifth.
In Spain, the quinto real on mining
of all precious metals and minerals (in theory; in practice, it was collected only on gold, silver, mercury, gemstones and pearls) was codified by the edict of February 1504, and (with occasional exceptional grants) remained in force through all the Spanish empire until the 18th C. In 1723, it was reduced to a diezmo (10%) and in 1777 it was reduced further to 3%, with an additional duty of 2% if shipped to Spain.
Tax
To tax is to impose a financial charge or other levy upon a taxpayer by a state or the functional equivalent of a state such that failure to pay is punishable by law. Taxes are also imposed by many subnational entities...
that reserves to the monarch
Monarch
A monarch is the person who heads a monarchy. This is a form of government in which a state or polity is ruled or controlled by an individual who typically inherits the throne by birth and occasionally rules for life or until abdication...
20% of all precious metals and other commodities (including slaves) acquired by his subjects as war loot
War loot
War loot refers to goods, valuables and property obtained by force from their lawful owners via looting during or after warfare. These "spoils of war" differ from tributes or other payments extracted after the fact by a victorious nation in that their extraction is largely arbitrary and immediate,...
, found as treasure
Treasure
Treasure is a concentration of riches, often one which is considered lost or forgotten until being rediscovered...
or extracted by mining
Mining
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...
. The 'royal fifth' was instituted in Medieval Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
states, Christian Iberia
Iberia
The name Iberia refers to three historical regions of the old world:* Iberian Peninsula, in Southwest Europe, location of modern-day Portugal and Spain** Prehistoric Iberia...
n kingdom
Monarchy
A monarchy is a form of government in which the office of head of state is usually held until death or abdication and is often hereditary and includes a royal house. In some cases, the monarch is elected...
s and their overseas colonial empires during the age of exploration.
The 'royal fifth' has a dual origin. In Christian kingdoms, it partly comes from the Medieval legal conception of seigneural or regalian rights over the natural patrimony, which assigned to the monarch or feudal overlord original property rights over all unclaimed, undiscovered and undeveloped natural resources (e.g. precious metals in the subsoil, salt in the rock, virgin forests, fish in the sea, etc.) within his jurisdiction. Consequently, private individuals who extracted these natural resources owed compensation to their original 'owner' (the monarch).
The specification of the 20% tax rate on war booty, stems from the practice in Islamic states. It was institutionalized from the start of the Islamic conquest, with the rate set down in the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
, in Sura VIII (Al-Anfal
Al-Anfal
Sura Al-Anfal is the eighth chapter of the Qur'an, with 75 verses. It is a Medinan sura, completed after theBattle of Badr. It forms a pair with the next sura, At-Tawba.-Badr:...
), verse 41:
In practice, the share of the fifth reserved to the Prophet's family lapsed after Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
's death. The early Rashidun Caliphs, notably Caliph Omar, set down regulatory guidelines for what could and could not be regarded as war spoils, and assigned the fifth for welfare distribution. The 'fifth' eventually became an important source of financing for the Caliphal administration and army. Schools
Fiqh
Fiqh is Islamic jurisprudence. Fiqh is an expansion of the code of conduct expounded in the Quran, often supplemented by tradition and implemented by the rulings and interpretations of Islamic jurists....
of Islamic law were divided on whether the fifth extended to treasure
Treasure
Treasure is a concentration of riches, often one which is considered lost or forgotten until being rediscovered...
troves and mining
Mining
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...
. Some schools (notably, the Hanafi
Hanafi
The Hanafi school is one of the four Madhhab in jurisprudence within Sunni Islam. The Hanafi madhhab is named after the Persian scholar Abu Hanifa an-Nu‘man ibn Thābit , a Tabi‘i whose legal views were preserved primarily by his two most important disciples, Abu Yusuf and Muhammad al-Shaybani...
te), regarded treasure and mines as 'spoils' and thus subject to the fifth, while others (notably the Shafi'i
Shafi'i
The Shafi'i madhhab is one of the schools of fiqh, or religious law, within the Sunni branch of Islam. The Shafi'i school of fiqh is named after Imām ash-Shafi'i.-Principles:...
te and Hanbali
Hanbali
The Hanbali school is one the schools of Fiqh or religious law within Sunni Islam. The jurisprudence school traces back to Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal but was institutionalized by his students. Hanbali jurisprudence is considered very strict and conservative, especially regarding questions of dogma...
te) regarded them as subject only to the conventional rates, e.g. zakat
Zakat
Zakāt , one of the Five Pillars of Islam, is the giving of a fixed portion of one's wealth to charity, generally to the poor and needy.-History:Zakat, a practice initiated by Muhammed himself, has played an important role throughout Islamic history...
.
The Medieval Taifa
Taifa
In the history of the Iberian Peninsula, a taifa was an independent Muslim-ruled principality, usually an emirate or petty kingdom, though there was one oligarchy, of which a number formed in the Al-Andalus after the final collapse of the Umayyad Caliphate of Córdoba in 1031.-Rise:The origins of...
kingdoms of al-Andalus
Al-Andalus
Al-Andalus was the Arabic name given to a nation and territorial region also commonly referred to as Moorish Iberia. The name describes parts of the Iberian Peninsula and Septimania governed by Muslims , at various times in the period between 711 and 1492, although the territorial boundaries...
embraced the Hanafi argument and institutionalized the fifth on war spoils, treasure troves and mining. The 'royal fifth' (quinto real) was adopted by the Christian states of the Iberian peninsula
Iberian Peninsula
The Iberian Peninsula , sometimes called Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe and includes the modern-day sovereign states of Spain, Portugal and Andorra, as well as the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar...
(Castile
Crown of Castile
The Crown of Castile was a medieval and modern state in the Iberian Peninsula that formed in 1230 as a result of the third and definitive union of the crowns and parliaments of the kingdoms of Castile and León upon the accession of the then King Ferdinand III of Castile to the vacant Leonese throne...
, Portugal
Kingdom of Portugal
The Kingdom of Portugal was Portugal's general designation under the monarchy. The kingdom was located in the west of the Iberian Peninsula, Europe and existed from 1139 to 1910...
, etc.) during the reconquista
Reconquista
The Reconquista was a period of almost 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms succeeded in retaking the Muslim-controlled areas of the Iberian Peninsula broadly known as Al-Andalus...
and extended during to their overeas colonies in the Americas, Africa and Asia. They became an important part of crown finance.
During the age of exploration, Spanish and Portuguese captains and conquistadores were careful to always set aside the royal fifth from any spoils they captured, and accusations of embezzling the 'royal fifth' ended the careers of a few of them (e.g. Alonso de Ojeda
Alonso de Ojeda
Alonso de Ojeda was a Spanish navigator, governor and conquistador. His name is sometimes spelled Alonzo and Oxeda.-Early life:...
, Pedro Alonso Niño
Pedro Alonso Niño
Pedro Alonso Nino was a Spanish explorer, also known as El Negro .Born in Palos de Moguer, Spain, he explored the coasts of Africa, and accompanied Christopher Columbus during his third voyage that saw the discovery of Trinidad and the mouths of the Orinoco River...
). Nonetheless, to encourage exploration and colonization, Iberian monarchs often allowed explorers and colonial developers to retain part or all of the royal fifth, for at least some period of time. The conditions were usually spelled out in captaincy
Captaincy
A captaincy is a historical administrative division of the former Spanish and Portuguese colonial empires. Each was governed by a captain general.-In the Portuguese Empire:...
contracts or royal grants, e.g. in 1402, Jean de Béthencourt
Jean de Béthencourt
Jean de Béthencourt was a French explorer who, in 1402, led an expedition to the Canary Islands, landing first on the north side of Lanzarote...
was allowed to keep the royal fifth as a condition for the conquest of the Canary Island for Castile; in 1443, the Portuguese Prince Henry the Navigator was granted the royal fifth on all enterprise in the Madeira
Madeira
Madeira is a Portuguese archipelago that lies between and , just under 400 km north of Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the north Atlantic Ocean and an outermost region of the European Union...
islands and sub-saharan Africa; in 1492, Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus was an explorer, colonizer, and navigator, born in the Republic of Genoa, in northwestern Italy. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean that led to general European awareness of the American continents in the...
was allowed to retain 10% of the royal fifth of the West Indies (although he famously argued he was promised more); the 1532 contracts of the captains-donatary of colonial Brazil
Colonial Brazil
In the history of Brazil, Colonial Brazil, officially the Viceroyalty of Brazil comprises the period from 1500, with the arrival of the Portuguese, until 1815, when Brazil was elevated to kingdom alongside Portugal as the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves.During the over 300 years...
allowed them to retain 5% of the royal fifth.
In Spain, the quinto real on mining
Mining
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...
of all precious metals and minerals (in theory; in practice, it was collected only on gold, silver, mercury, gemstones and pearls) was codified by the edict of February 1504, and (with occasional exceptional grants) remained in force through all the Spanish empire until the 18th C. In 1723, it was reduced to a diezmo (10%) and in 1777 it was reduced further to 3%, with an additional duty of 2% if shipped to Spain.